Re: First light - NOTHING HAPPENED!

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Hans Scholze by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <hanscs-at-eagle.ptialaska-dot-net>

Robert,

I would guess that you don't have enough capacitance.  You are probably
running out of primary turns before the resonance of the primary can be
brought down to match the resonant frequancy of the secondary.  This was the
problem I initially had with my coil, which is similar in size to yours.  I
believe I ended up using something like 12 beer bottle caps, which worked
quite well until I switched to an MMC.

Hans

----- Original Message -----
From: "Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
To: <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>
Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2001 3:52 PM
Subject: First light - NOTHING HAPPENED!


> Original poster: "Robert by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>"
<obiwan1186-at-sunflower-dot-com>
>
> Bad results on the first light of my 4" coil. here's the specs
>
> secondary - 4" pvc wound with 850 turns of 22 guage wire and sealed with
> polyurithane. sealed off with lexan discs. heavily grounded with 5, 15"
> sections of copper pipe pounded into soaking wet ground and wired in
> parallel.
>
> primary - 8" inner diameter - 13 turns of 1/4" copper tubing spaced 1/4"
> apart on lexan supports
>
> spark gap - RQ/TCBOR gap with 7 gaps, 1/2" copper pipe.
>
> capacitor - 1 2L soda bottle with salt water on the inside and the
> outside.
>
> topload - 2 pie pans bolted back-to-back and 4" aluminum dryer ducting.
>
> power supply - 15/30 NST
>
> I turned on the power and heard the spark gap firing but no sparks were
> breaking out at the top. i checked again to make sure i had it wired
> correctly, and it still didn't work. i tried getting 1" strikes to a
> grounded rod, still nothing. i then attempted to tune it by tapping into
> the primary at various locations. still nothing. i then tapped into
> other gaps in the RQ gap and tinkered with the primary to no avail. I
> then checked my tranny to make sure it hadn't fried but it worked
> perfectly. I decided to give up when it started raining, and i thought
> "rain+high voltage=ZZZZAAAAP" . Can anyone please tell me why it is not
> working??!!!
>
>
>
>